Almost Dying Changes Nothing
by Human Stain
Summary: They couldn’t blame her when living became so much harder than the other option. But in the end…Dying just wasn’t supposed to be this easy.


A/N: I'm from Germany so I apologize for the crappy English but I really had to write this one, because of everything that had happened. =(

**Almost Dying Changes Nothing – Dying Changes Everything**

There were two things she became aware of at the same time. One was the steady and almost melodic sound of pure oxygen flowing through meters of plastic wires. The other was the sound of her heartbeat converted into a mechanical beeping. After the wedding she'd imagined Alex and herself dancing to this sound. Their own, special first dance. Nobody had something like that. In the surreal world she lived in, this was her heaven. Not Denny. Not anymore.

Somewhere between conciousness and unconciousness she tried to remember a time without pain.

When she was the hard-core cardio-chick.

_I'm going to go in early. I'm going to get on hard-core, Erica-Hahn cardio and I'm gonna kick ass at it. And when I kick ass at cardio, it's going to piss Cristina off, but it won't matter, because I'll be a kick-ass cardio god._

When she'd saved this man at the ferry.

"_Okay, that can't happen. Do you understand me? Sounds can't happen. Freaking out can't happen. Because if you freak out, I'm gonna freak out and I'm the one who's holding a power drill to your friend's brain. So if you're gonna vomit, if you're gonna make sounds, step away. If you're gonna stay here, you're gonna have to pull it together. __Okay?"_

The moment she met Denny.

_"Can I ask you something personal?"  
_

_"If I say no?"  
_

_"I'll hold my breath, which will stop my heart, killing me. You're right here, you'll be charged with murder. Life in prison, loved by a big old girl named Hildy."_

_"So my options are homicide charges or inappropriate personal questions from a patient", she said smirking._

_"I know, kind of sucks."_

When she met the others.

"_Hi, I'm Isobel Stevens, but everyone calls me Izzie."_

Taking a deep breath she tried desperately to focus on sleeping but her moderately awake mind shifted to thoughts she'd tried to block out for weeks. The fact, that just nothing was the same anymore.

The moment she opened her eyes, she wished she hadn't. Pain hit her like an avalanche. Strong. Everlasting. She gasped several times as she tried to remember what had happened.

Her breath came in pants when she realized where she was and that nobody was next to there. Her headscarf had vanished and she felt the cool antiseptic hospital air like an omnipresent fog which was trying to devour her. She fought down a panic attack and the desire for her knitting needles was almost more than she was ready to bear.

She remembered some of her mothers old yoga videos she'd used to watch when Izzie had been too young to understand the word of distress. _Inhale. Exhale. _It should've been a way to calm her.

Maybe it didn't work. In the end she might just have been like her mother.

Snapshots of a screaming Bailey and a crying Alex played in front of her inner eye. There were also Cristina and the chief, George's syph nurse Olivia, smashing her motionless body like a puppet.

The pale moonlight was shining trough the windows of her single room, painting the walls in shades of ice blue and worn out grey. She'd always liked the night the most, for some unknown reason it had just calmed her. Sometimes so much she'd lost track of time. She wasn't afraid of it anymore. The drug cocktail twirling in her head made her aware of every single minute. Like a hour glass she was step by step drowning in.

The nausea, the fatigue, the constant pain. According to her oncologist this was something she had to be grateful for, even though she still couldn't figure out why.

These stupid hopeful verdicts you could find in fortune cookies came into her mind.

_Embrace the pain. Swallow the fear. Time is the most precious gift. _

There had also been the DNR and Alex who was begging her not to die. The situation had been odd because she'd realized weeks ago that some things weren't in her power anymore. He should've begged Sheppard, Bailey or her oncologist to not let her die.

And maybe he should've known better. They were doctors. They weren't supposed to save everybody.

For a moment she let herself been carried away by the thought that maybe it was all a bad dream. She could've hit her head, loosing her hair because of a craniotomy. Maybe now she could be healthy and happy again. Strong and…alive.

The sparkling plastic ring on her left ring finger was proofing her wrong.

A wave of nausea hit her like a truck train. She remembered a time when she'd been fast enough to grab the kidney dish, but that was than…this is now.

Tears welled in her eyes when another wave hit her just as forceful as the first one.

Gastric acid had corroded her oesophagus and now not even swallowing her own salvia was painless. Sighing she sat up. She almost cried when she realized that her hands were shaking. She was a doctor. She knew the signs of liver failure. But that didn't mean she had to accept it. Not yet.

She remembered Alex words.

_Hold on…_

_Be strong, everyday…I'm here._

She covered her eyes trying to calm her breathing. She'd promised Bailey to try, living.

The door opened. Finally.

Meredith was wearing a long black dress; an almost transparent scarf was covering her shoulders. Her hair was held back by a purple hair tie and several clips. At fist she didn't say anything. She just stood there and stared. Minutes. Maybe hours.

It was, when she realized that her friend's hands were shaking that she wasn't going to say anything.

"I died…", Izzie whispered.

"You did…" Her voice was gruff. Kind of. Had she been crying? How long had she slept?

"Mer, what happened?"

It seemed like Meredith had just started breathing. As if a heavy burden had been lifted from her shoulders. She sat down next to her, smoothing the white sheet with her fingertips. When she started talking it was Izzies turn to stop breathing. She laid back while she was listening to the story of her best friend's death. She watched the visible tension Meredith held drop as she finally came to an end of her story.

Izzie opened her mouth. Once. Twice. It wasn't until she felt wetness on her gown that she realized she'd been crying. She tried to imagine George with the smashed face and broken body but there was just this omnipresent picture of his smiling face burned inside her head.

Her mind was blank, suppressing the situation. It just wasn't there. These days, this year…It just never happened. Everything she wanted was for her life to go on the way it had before. A sigh escaped her as she rubbed her face and tried to sit up.

She realized too late that she shouldn't sit up quickly anymore. At least, Meredith is fast enough with the dish. She wanted to give up. She really did. No matter what she did, how many surgeries or treatments she'd tried it didn't became better.

She didn't know how long she and Meredith had been staring at each other.

"I have to go…" Her voice is only a whisper. Almost as if she was regretting to leave a dying friend.

"I know…Could you please…"

Between the both of them there weren't any boundaries and as a doctor Meredith knew what her roommate was asking for. Second later Izzie felt a warm wave of painlessness flood through her system. Thank god for Dilaudid.

"Sleepy?"

"Getting there…", she murmured silently.

Meredith was holding her hand for several seconds before she got up. Her footsteps faded in his ears until silence finally condemned her.

She laid on her side while her thoughts were drifting to George and Denny and Ellis and the poor bomb squad guy. She shouldn't dream of dying. She'd made promises.

They couldn't blame her when living became so much harder than the other option.

But in the end…Dying just wasn't supposed to be this easy.

The End?


End file.
